The Sun Refused to Shine
by sweetcyanide666
Summary: We always expected a happy ever after. We always knew in New Moon that Edward would return. We always thought that Bella was the strong one. What if we were wrong? This story will cover Edward's journey through the depth of darkness, a hundred years after the events of New Moon. Rated for sex, dark themes, depressing topics, and the like.
1. A Hundred Years to Live

**It will be as if I never existed…**

 _I never thought it would end like this. I did the unthinkable, the un-gentlemanly, leaving her in the forest that night. But she was human, soft, pliable, able to live again. She was able to breathe, and her heart was able to beat. I thought those would continue without me._

 _I remember the last time I saw her. She lay in her bed so peacefully that evening, as if she had always slept there alone. I sat by her window, watching her sleep, praying to hear my name as I had once only months before._

 _"_ _Jacob…my Jacob…"_

 _I froze, hearing words that I never wanted to hear. Forcing myself to believe what I didn't want to be true. I believed then that Alice was right, that Bella's future had disappeared because I was no longer a part of it. Yet Bella was dreaming of another now. Her future had already changed._

 _Had I truly understood the future, I would have never left that room. I would have rushed to her side, begged her forgiveness, taken her in my arms. I would have placed her sweet lips to mine and tasted her breath. I would have stolen her life in exchange for immortality._

 _Yet here I am, a hundred years later, and Bella is gone. I'm not sure that she was ever here. Perhaps she was nothing more than a dream, a fantastic memory._

I stopped writing as I heard a slight rustling at my chamber door, slightly put off at how deep in thought I had been. Whoever it was had managed to creep within striking distance without my notice. However, a moment's notice had been enough for me to recognize the mental voice. I looked up slowly, having already assessed that Jane stood silently in my presence.

"Aro expects you," Jane stated calmly, her cape gathered around her. Not a question, but an acknowledgment of fact. I was expected, so I would appear. I simply stared at her. A cruel smile skirted onto her face, as she imagined how easy it would be for her to slip and cause me pain. I let her fantasize, knowing that even Jane could not pierce my mental shield. The pain I had lived through every moment for a hundred years past had built a wall that not even she, evil child, could break. I lived alone in my mind and with my ghost.

"I will join Aro when I am ready, and not a moment before." My stance made clear the tone behind my words. I would not be summoned as a subordinate or a pet. Jane started to speak back, but bit her tongue instead. She bowed curtly and strode back down the hall. I listened to her steps recede, and I sighed.

I closed my diary, certain that my afternoon solace had ended. Jane could easily be dismissed, but Aro would not be as easily dissuaded. He wished to see me, and no matter my power, I would eventually cave to his will. I stood slowly with the weight of my age and floated across the room to my chest of drawers.

As I placed my diary within it secret compartment, I caught a brief glance of myself in the ornate wall mirror. My chambers had been decorated in the gothic style of the 12th and 13th century, another of Aro's many fascinations. The twisted metals, heavy carved woods, dark crevasses all matched my inner soul, so I didn't mind horribly. I only minded the mirror.

I drew my eyes upward to the eyes of the reflection, looking at myself for the first time in over a year. I couldn't see anything except my eyes.

Eyes that burn bright red with the blood of tens of thousands.

I turned sharply and fled to the main hall in search of Aro.


	2. Light of All Lights

I hadn't always been this way. I knew that much. My life before running to Aro and the Volturi was hazy, but I could still remember fractions of it. I could see Alice's pixie hair, although I couldn't remember the name of handsome stranger by her side. I could hear sounds of Rosalie and Emmett, but not the words or their meanings. I could feel Esme's arms, but couldn't see her face. I remembered waking up to Carlisle for the first time. Yet with the fragments of all these thoughts, I knew I was missing something.

I shook the memories away as I stalked briskly down the hall. Aro knew better than to disturb me during the afternoon hours, my personal time away from the coven. I needed that time to maintain my head and control my feelings. It was difficult to live around so many vampires. I spent most of my day consciously forcing voices out of my head, if only to avoid the migraine that ensued such a mental onslaught. By the afternoon, I needed to be alone.

But in typical Aro style, when the old man felt the pull of a whim, my person space did not matter. After a century of this pettiness, I should have adjusted. I remember being called from my room once simply to marvel at a butterfly that had made its way into the turret. Another time, it was to speak of the history of dust. I shook my head briefly as I strolled through the antechamber and into the main hall, praying that this day would not be another one of pettiness.

The hall fell to a hush as I entered, both a literal hush and a mental one as well. Aro and Marcus were already seated on their thrones at the center of the hall when I entered, Aro looking anxiously for me. I stared harshly at Aro as I took my place seated at his left hand. Since the untimely demise of Caius some years back, I had been the third member of the Volturi's ruling coven. I had my suspicions about Aro's involvement in the death of his "friend," but one didn't speak of such matters in the light. One didn't speak of such matters and live, at least.

Aro's face turned with a slight smile as I hit the chair brusquely. "Was there some need for speaking to poor Jane so harshly? She came back rather in a fright, and I assured her that you meant no harm. Really, Edward, you must cultivate that tongue of yours. Become more like Marcus here…silent and commanding."

I looked over at Marcus, whose mind was centuries away from this court and decades away from the words of his brother. Marcus commanded nothing, not even his own mind. In fact, I could remember only a few brief moments when Marcus did, in fact, exist in the same realm as us. Since the loss of his love, his mate, Marcus had been little more than a shell. His body lived on in vampiric fashion, but his mind had died decades ago. His mental voice rarely groaned above a babble, and it was never comprehendible. Aro kept Marcus alive now only for the benefit of his powers - Aro was nothing if not practical.

I turned my eyes back to Aro. "Get on with it, then. Why did you call?" My voice was rough, as my mind sought to pick out of Aro's head the purpose of his summons. I immediately saw a young vampire, a trainee, leading a small group toward the chamber. "Oh, Jane was merely summoning me for lunch," I hissed quietly. I could have done without the food, but I settled into my chair for the entertainment. Something beautiful existed within the horror of these victim's deaths. Something burned through my heart when I heard the terror of their screams ringing through these halls. It was the only time I felt alive, felt that I existed. It was the closest I felt to her.

This group was a small one, primarily young adults. Their thoughts were on booze and dancing, not on the architecture of the city around them. College students on spring break, no doubt. I had heard these thoughts before. Yet one girl in particular caught my eye. She was young, perhaps younger than the rest, with brown hair that fell about her shoulders in waves. Light, translucent skins that looked too frail to cover bones. The body proportions were wrong, but the eyes were not. Flat brown eyes. Close enough.

Aro immediately noticed my attention, as I stiffened in my seat. He smiled curtly and extended his hand. "My boy…would you not like a treat? Take her. There are plenty more for us all." I needed no further invitation. I floated from my throne to her side, taking to my knee as I approached. Her eyes caught mine with a look of apprehension and delight. I smiled at her, spilling out the most beautiful Italian in the world.

"I…um…don't speak that?" She stuttered, clearly embarrassed. Her mind screamed of the impossibilities of this situation. She wasn't good enough, wasn't beautiful enough. Why me? She though over and over. I couldn't explain to her that she was replacing a ghost, that I heard someone else's voice repeating those words. That's never a good method to use when attempting to woo a young girl. I had tried it once.

"You're beautiful. Perfect. And I know of a private room nearby, decorated with priceless beauties that would pale next to your light. May I, my bella angela?" I rose from the floor and extended my arm. Of course, she took it. They always did. I turned back to glance at Aro only for a second as I led this young wonder from the room. As we left the inner hall, the doors closed behind us. I knew it would be only moments before the feast began.


	3. The Sweet Drink of Life

She was much more difficult to lead back than I imagined, but once we entered my chamber, it was always the same. She flitted around, looking at trivial, material objects. Fawning over a chair or a trunk. Gazing upward at the ceiling, hundreds of feet above us. Eying the large bed in the corner. Even if she didn't know what I was, she knew what it was and what it meant. I smiled at her darkly and removed my shirt.

As always, it started off passionately. The years of turmoil and guarded feelings came out in the kisses and touches between us. I stripped her of her clothes, ravaging her body with my eyes. I don't know how much of what I saw was real nor how much was imprinted upon the subconscious mind, yet she was so like my Bella. No, she was Bella, as glorious and stunning as ever, cast in the golden light that drifted through the rafter windows high above me. As her hands traced their way down my body, I felt comfort for my inner longing. But as always, the beauty began to fade as we progressed.

She was kneeling before me, her mouth shaft-deep on my cock, when I first noticed the flaws. Little things, really. First, I noticed that the hair color was wrong. My Bella's hair had more shine, more depth than this one's did. The imposter's hair had a shade of light blonde running through. There were the hands, rough, chaffed, unlike my Bella's soft skin. Then, it was her smell. Coffee. Pine. Not Bella. I grabbed the girl by the hair and pulled her away, fire burning in my red eyes.

She looked up at me, horrified that she had done something wrong. But how could I explain that her only sin was entering Volterra and looking like my ghost. Her only sin was haunting me with memories of my lost love. I looked down into her eyes, trying to smile softly at her. The lust and rage must have both burnt through, though, because she began to screech and attempted to cover herself. I allowed her to scurry backwards with her hands, knowing that she was doomed. Just before her back hit the wall, I swept forward in vampire speed and grabbed her body in my arms.

"You will be mine tonight, love. You have made a devil's deal that you can pay for only with blood."

Everything else faded as I bit into her neck. I drained her slowly as her pain deadened, until her mouth grew silent and her mind slowly stopped screaming. I drank until her body was empty of blood.

I drank until my soul was empty.

I threw her lifeless body away from myself as I fell forward to the stone floor. I had played this scene out before. I would lay her cold body on the bed, sobbing at my own weakness. Aro would call me to his gardens, sympathetic of my pain. I would vow to forget her again, if only for a while. I would forget her, until the next young memory walked into our hall. I would seduce and kill the next. A vicious cycle that repeated itself without end.

This was it. I was living in hell.

After a few hours, I pulled myself together. I pulled myself back together. I looked toward the corpse, but I had no emotion. I wanted to carry her off to the gardens, give her a proper burial. I wanted to tear her body to shreds. Instead, I went to my chest and opened the compartment where I had left my diary. This book held the weight of my soul, and I struggled as I walked to my desk and opened it to write.

 _My dear Bella, I have murdered you again. I have failed you again. Each time, I promise to be strong, and I fail. I am as unworthy of heaven as I ever was of your love. I am damned to walk the earth alone. The earth is my hell now – no fire and brimstone could burn worse._

 _I still question my actions, love. I feel now, more so than ever, that I was wrong to leave you there. But when I heard you speak his name, when I saw that you spent your days on the reservations and your nights dreaming of him, I had no choice. Yours was the only mind closed to me, and had I only been able to hear you…I would have never left you that night!_

 _My memories give me no release. I am haunted by your ghost, without even the satisfaction of my dreams to comfort me. If I could dream, it would be only of you. But when I close my eyes, I see only you and your blood. I see only that day, eternally flashing before my eyes._

 _I murdered you then, and I left you there to die._

I paused, collecting myself. Thinking of that period of life still tore at my heart. I remembered those carefree days, the feeling of love that surrounded my existence. My heart had ceased to beat decades earlier, yet Bella had given my soul a new life. When I left, it tore a hole in my chest. When she left, it demolished my soul.

I turned the pages in my diary, hundreds of pages filled with thousands of words. Meaningless words. I turned back to that first entry, that first moment when I knew my existence had been shattered.

 _Bella is dead. Even as I write that, I can't accept the words._

 _I closed my eyes and took an unnecessary breath, steadying myself before I read on._

 _I was too late to stop her, too late to do anything but hold her dying body. Alice saw it all, damn her, but it was too late. I should never have left her. I thought she was happy then, but now I know. She was so much better at lying than I ever gave her credit. I lied to her there in the forest, but her lie was so much more deviant. The cut went so much deeper._

I slammed the offensive book shut, hurling across the room. The cover accepted a few more scratches and dents as it hit the wall and fell to the floor. I fell to my knees, a feral screech coming from my throat. Part of me wanted to shred the pages, destroy every last memory that tied me to her. Instead, I knelt on the floor sobbing, dry heaves wracking my chest. She had always been my drug, and all these years later, I was still an addict.


	4. Beyond Dreams

Three days later, I stirred again. Aro had been worried, as had the rest of the court. Their worry hadn't affected me. I had learned both to be still and to ignore existence. A few years back, I had torn apart an entire village, growing introspective and depressive after the fact. I refused to eat, choosing to hole myself up in a mountain cave. After spending a month without moving, without breathing, time ceases to exist. Once I discovered the limits of time in that cave, I truly became an immortal. The future stretched endlessly before me, with no limit to the things I could see or do. That was the moment I choose to return to Volterra and join the Volturi. My life was unlimited, and what should an immortal do except rule his domain?

I no longer took issue with my natural food source. I fed on humans regularly, and I relished in the experience. Their pain in those final moments of life mirrored the anguish I felt in my soul. As their minds drew closer to that silence, my soul screamed out for final peace. But God is cruel, and I always lived on after I had drained my human guests. Human blood made my powers infinitely stronger. I was focused, dark, brooding. I was ruled by my passions. I was controlled by a ghost.

When I first fled to the Volturi, I was seeking my own death. I had always known that I would walk this earth with my Bella and that my life would end with hers. When she died, all that was human within me died as well. I sought my own death. But to no one's surprise but mine, Aro refused.

He saw my pain, but he saw my gift as well. He welcomed me to the Volturi even as he refused my request. Initially, I was enraged. How could he trivialize my pain? How could he dismiss my loss? Regardless, I accepted his offer after my village incident, if only for a time. He did promise my death if I disliked my position with the Volturi. Although I kept his offer stowed away in the recesses of my mind, I had yet to request my death again.

In those early years of my life in Volterra, I related best with Marcus. His thoughts were always on his lost mate, and his feelings mirrored mine exactly. But after a few years, I realized the shallow dimension of his sorrow. He was completely destroyed by his wife's death, but his mind never moved beyond that. His thoughts were merely whispers, a soft hum, background noise used to fill in an empty screen. He was a shell, as dead as the undead could possibly be. I would not be like that, I thought in those early days. Apparently, I was wrong.

I was so much worse than that.

I stood slowly, making my way across my chamber to the fallen book. For the past three days, I had stared at its cover. I don't know what possessed me to write down my past, write down my emotions. I had perfect recall of every moment since my change. Yet as the years wore on, I found myself losing touch with those earlier years. I was young by vampiric standards, nearly two hundred years young, but I still found my memories to be fading. In those early days, immediately after her death, I feared losing that only part of her I had left. I feared losing my memory of her. In that moment, I chose to start writing it all down.

As I picked up the book and looked down at that first entry, the full emotion of that moment slammed into me again.

 _Bella is dead._

I could immediately see her in my mind, lying in the grass in our meadow. Our meadow, not mine. She had gone there to seek answers, to seek me, but she found neither. She chose to end her pain there instead.

I could remember the minute that I decided to return. I couldn't stand being away from her any longer. I checked in on her every week or so, unable to accept that she had dismissed me so easily. She seemed so happy with Jake, but I secretly hoped that she still missed me. I pined for her, yet I knew it was best.

Everything happened quickly after that.

It seems that my decision to return that day led to Alice's vision of a changed future. Her phone call came too late. Alice saw Bella's future unfolding rapidly in the meadow, and the end result terrified me. The moment I heard the fear in Alice's voice, I started to run. Never had I moved so quickly, and never had I cared less if someone saw me. My only thought was about Bella. My Bella.

It was brutally cold that day, snow covering the ground. Everything was dead. I saw her sitting on her knees in the middle of the field as I stopped short. Her smell, her blood, overwhelmed me. As she turned her pale white face toward me, I saw the red pools that surrounded her body. She had been bleeding, and for quite some time too. The realization of what she had done sickened me, and for the first time, not even her sweet blood could tempt me.

I was too late.

She made an attempt to stand, but never made it to her feet. I rushed forward, catching her as she fell, cradling her in my arms. Her body was cold, almost as cold as mine, and her face had taken on a chalky look. Her lips cracked into a smile.

"My Edward. I love you, Edward. Heaven? We're in heaven. I always knew you would be in my heaven."

My memory had slid smoothly into my diary reading, and I looked up from the page with a renewed agony in my chest. That one moment had never dimmed in my memory. My angel was gone, and only I was to blame. I left Forks, trying to save her from certain death at my hands, and had thus killed her.

Her eyes fluttered shut that last time as I lay her back in the snow. Her heartbeat was slowing rapidly, and I anguished at the thought of what would happen when it stopped. Even if I wanted to change her, wanted to save her, I couldn't. I was willing to damn her soul now, and I couldn't. There wasn't enough blood left in her body to make the change. I sat there watching her for a moment, an eternity, until I felt a ripple of consciousness from the edge of the field. I looked up into Alice's eyes briefly, the pain written in her expression, and I ran. I left Bella again, and I ran. I couldn't accept the reality that this was the end of my beloved. I had caused this end.

I have spent every day since trying to erase that vision from my mind.

I felt the person's thoughts before I hear the footfall. Aro had sent Jane to gather me again. I sighed as I righted myself from the floor and set my cloak straight. No need to look disheveled among the coven. They had seen enough of me at my worst. I looked to the door as Jane took her last steps toward the threshold. "Tell Aro I am on my way," I spoke out pointedly before she could even open her mouth. Her eyes grew wide, and she scurried away without another word or thought. Her mind had become increasingly easy to read, and her current desires for sexual satisfaction and a mate were growing tiresome. I had no desire to be with Jane, and my occasional human escapades were more than enough to satiate my sexual desires. Jane was pressing a closed subject.

As I approached the door to the main hall, the atmosphere grew thick. Something, someone within the hall had set everyone on edge. Murmuring voices and minds roared in my head, opinions raging around me. Aro wanted a favor of me. He wanted me to silence a problem. I could feel it.

But the headache of everyone's thoughts was already crushing me.


	5. Just Like a Crow

Much had changed in the past hundred years. Technology, landscape, culture. The quality of music had declined, which I blamed solely on that Beiber movement of the early 21st century. Fashion had become flamboyant, and the dandy had taken reign again. Humanity had progresses, evolved, although still not to the level where we could live at ease beside our food. The world was always changing, but we remained the same.

And so, it seemed, did Ireland.

Ireland seemed to be as frozen in time as we vampires were. The people were still as backward and superstitious as ever. Demons still lived in every hollow and shadow. The solution to every problem still resided in a pub, at the bottom of a bottle. Religion had all but been abandoned outside of Ireland, but the Irish still fought as if it were 1916.

It had to be Ireland.

As I stood outside the stone hospital building in Northern Ireland, rain thrashing against my face and drenching my clothes, I damned my life and my ability. I knew that Aro's request would lead me on some godforsaken journey. Now, that journey meant walking around this miry wasteland in search of a rouge vampire. Why? Because I would hear the vampire's thoughts and be able to find it without coming too close to danger. Or so went Aro's excuse.

I fucking hated it when I was right.

Apparently, this vampire had let itself into an abandoned mental hospital that was set out in the moors. Well, not truly abandoned. Some mental patients resided there, and it was staffed by those who cared for the residents, but those who resided inside had been abandoned long ago. No one cared if they lived or died. Realistically, they were already worse than dead, locked within the craziness of their own minds. Perhaps that was why the vampire had chosen this place as its home. Why shouldn't the damned find life among the dead?

At first, it had only been rumors. News clips that ranted about a haunted hospital where the insane saw dark ghosts and the patients all-too-often wound up dead. The situation had been brought to our attention months ago, but with little proof of a wild vampire, we wrote it off to the superstitions of the Irish people. If I ran to Ireland each time a peasant saw the illusion of a ghost, I would spend more of my days there than in Volterra. Damn Stoker to the deepest level of hell.

But it all changed yesterday when most of the patients in the hospital were found dead. Literally dead. Many a snapped neck, or so the rumors went. The remaining patients were removed hastily, and talk sprung up in the town of demons and nightwalkers. Naturally, Aro wanted me to take care of the situation. Marcus was useless in these matters, and Aro only left the city in the most extreme of circumstances. Of course, it would be me.

My life really was hell.

I projected hateful thoughts before me as I stalked across the field, crushing every blade of grass into fine particles. I wanted to find this vampire, and quickly, so that I could go back to Volterra and brood. I hated being away from my chamber. My sanctuary. My steps quickened, although I kept within human speed. God forbid one of those noisy Irish countryfolk be out wandering the moors and see a man disappear. That would be yet another mess for me to clean.

The two guard trainees flanked me, worried thoughts rolling through their minds. In truth, I didn't need them or their help. Aro had sent them more for the experience of seeing me kill than to gain any experience of their own.

And I would kill.

I slowed as I reached the arched doorway. The ancient crumbling bricks seemed to speak out to me, warning me of the decay within. I could learn to love a place like this. It truly did seem haunted. I shivered as I stepped within the shadow of the archway, not because of the physical change in temperature. Cold no longer bothered me. Instead, I shivered because it seemed the appropriate thing to do. The atmosphere demanded it.

The front hallway of the hospital was abandoned, with the messy appearance that typically accompanies any human residents hastily abandoned. Sheets of paper and pieces of clothing littered the floor, while most of the doors stood half opened. I paused, gathering my senses about me, searching for my prey.

My mind found her thoughts, hazy thoughts, in the large room directly ahead of us. Through her eyes, it seemed as if the room had once been used as a dining hall, although the peeled wallpaper and rickety seating voided the room of any feelings of homeliness. She was sitting crosslegged in the middle of the room, picking at something on the floor. A rat, I thought.

In my mind, she seemed so small. I couldn't tell what color her hair was, only that it was cropped short and coated in mud. Her clothes had been reduced to mere rags, shapeless and dirty, barely covering her body. She seemed totally distracted, so I decided to make my move.

Her eyes jerked toward the door before I even entered it. Then she snapped. She jumped into a crouch, her eyes crazy and livid. I tried to touch her mind again, but I couldn't capture a complete thought. Her mind was fragmented, filled with raw emotions and shutterfly thoughts. As if she had been shattered and her mind was still reeling to find true north.

As I glanced back, her eyes locked with mine. "Edward…" she hissed, and her thoughts immediately turned red in colour. She knew me. Not only that, but she had the intention to kill me.

I was missing something.

Her memories were still hazy and fragmented, but they began to string together in a type of story. She was my friend once…no, more than a friend. Not a mate, either. No, the closest I could sense was that we were members of the same coven, yet we were bound so much more closely than those in Volterra were. She was friends with my Bella, too. And then the memory hit me.

Her name was Alice.

She was standing there, on the edge of the field, when my Bella died.

It was her eyes, filled with pain and guilt, that haunted me. Begged for forgiveness.

She was a teller of the future, but she couldn't prevent my Bella's death.

I hated her. I should hate her. But why did she want to kill me?

In all my memories, a nameless man stood next to her. He was distant from her, but always there. With that thought, my eyes shot around the area, searching the shadows for another. But no one was there. I tried to pull the man's name and location from her mind, but her thoughts were fuzzy again. I closed my eyes briefly to concentrate on the headache of her thoughts. It was like mindreading through an acid trip, were that even possible.

One of the trainees made a misstep toward Alice, and her gaze snapped to the imposer. Before I could even focus on the new thought, she had snatched the trainee by the hair and starting dragging him across the room. Metallic screeching echoed through the walls as Alice threw him against the wall and began clawing at his face. The second trainee made a move to save his comrade, but I was faster.

I grabbed Alice, tossing her quickly across the long room. She slammed through the wall and into the next room, hopping quickly to her feet and snarling viciously. I rushed at her, or at the place where I thought she was. After all these years, I had forgotten how quickly the damn pixie could pick my moves out of my mind. She was behind me, kicking me in the chest, before I had even turned fully around.

As I flew through the air, I saw the second trainee attack Alice. He grossly underestimated her power, though. Most people did. But unlike most people, this would be his last miscalculation. As he ran toward her, head first, she easily avoided his charge and removed his head while his body continued forward. He took three or four steps without a head before his body collapsed, skidding across the floor.

Her eyes went pitch black as she turned on the first trainee. Seeing her eyes, I realized that she hadn't fed in quite some while. She had broken the patients' necks but had not drunk of their blood. She was starving herself, a barbaric method of self-torture. Why she would refuse to feed, though, was beyond my comprehension.

The first trainee suffered even less than the second, stupider one. The first one never saw Alice coming. She tore his head from his body swiftly, viciously. Then she turned to me.

"Edward…"

With the hiss of her breath, she lunged at my throat.


	6. Chasing a Butterfly

**I took all your pictures off the wall**  
 **And wrapped them in newspaper blankets**  
 **I haven't slept in what seems like a century**  
 **And now I can barely breathe**

I caught her in the middle of her lunge, but the force of her fury drove me back into the wall. But as I caught her, I could feel that her energy was spent. She was weak, driven to fight only by a sense of self-defense. Her movements became choppy, uncoordinated, as she tried simply to inflict pain. Suddenly, her thoughts were so much less guarded, and her fury became immediately apparent.

The mysterious man that I remembered was no longer by her side. He left her, years ago, and broke the bond that they both shared. But in leaving her, he had destroyed her. Alice existed as a hollow shell of her former self. I caught glimpses of her memory, reeling in shock at the rapid deterioration after he left her. First she had wandered the vast wilderness of the Midwest, searching for him. For years, she neglected everything, just searching. But she never found him. She tried, as we all had tried at one point, to end her existence.

Her memories skipped several decades, stopping just a few years ago when she wandered into this hospital. In her mind, I could see that she could no longer distinguish the present that she was living and the future that she was envisioning. She felt more comfortable among those who were insane because their futures and pasts lacked distinction as well. They were as crazy as she felt, and the feelings calmed her. When a patient became too anxious or deteriorated too far, she would kill them out of mercy. But she didn't feed. In fact, from her memories alone, it would seem that she hadn't fed in years.

Yet even Alice's thought had rewritten themselves to avoid pain. She never thought of the person nor the reason why he had left. Decades of her life were missing. She lived as a broken person.

My poor, sweet Alice.

I let her continue to hit me as I stopped fighting and just held her. Her movements became slower, until she was no longer hitting me. Instead, she just wailed without words as I rocked her in my arms.

"Edward…"

I could feel the pain of my absence roll off her in waves, every moment of her time spent without me stabbing like a knife. She had missed her…brother. Missed the connection that we had shared. We were freaks among the undead. We had secrets that we both protected. Now, we shared something so much deeper.

We were learning to exist without our other half.

I wanted so much to take her with me, away from this dark place. The weight of the hospital's purpose assaulted me, and I wanted nothing more than to care for Alice, see her happy again. I looked down at Alice and watched her smile as the future shifted with my new resolve.

But I watched a second future unfold as well. The townsfolk were coming to destroy this building with a passion that could be fueled only with superstition. They were coming to destroy the place of death that she had created. Just as their religion commanded, they would return this building back to its Maker, burning the devil out just as they had burned the Druid out centuries earlier. It all made sense – the reason she had killed everyone here without feeding.

She wanted the Irish to destroy her with fire, and she used their superstition to achieve her goal.

I watch a thousand futures flash through her mind as I desperately searched for a way to save her. But no matter what I did, each vision ended with Alice engulfed flames. My eyes widened in shock as I looked down at her black eyes, her small smile. I could change my decision an infinite number of times, but her resolution was set. She had already chosen to die.

"You were the strong one, Edward." She said softly, her eyes taken on a faraway look. "You found a way to live without her." I started to protest, started to explain that my life had ended with Bella's, but Alice silenced me with a look. "I know you, Edward. I know you're hurt. But you've survived. Me? I can't live without him, and even if he came back to me…"

I saw that future play out in her mind. They would find each other, fight with word and thoughts, hurt each other so much worse. Whatever happened between the two of them, it had permanently marred their future. There was no reconciliation possible. He had changed Alice, for better or for worse, and she could never recover from the deception he had left in his wake. My dead heart broke, but I felt the absolution of her decision.

I can't go on without him.

I nodded, and I felt the tension leave her weak body. She had feared that I would fight her over this. But how could I? I remembered those feeling all too well, as I felt them still to this day. I worry about my soul, but Alice had long ago abandoned such religious feelings. She held no fear of death or of everlasting damnation. She only wanted peace.

Alice wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed my cheek softly as these thoughts rolled through my head. "Death us the only great adventure I have left, Edward." She said this with a smile, but I felt the sorrow in her thoughts.

Suddenly, her mind assaulted me. She wanted me to find Carlisle, to find Esme, to go…home. Yes, she called it home in her thoughts. An odd concept, but still, she wanted me to find them. They have the answers you need, she thought.

With this thought, her eyes turned to the vast window. The townfolks could be seen in the far distance, marching upon this place of death. My eyes flew back to her face, but I already knew that my pleas would be useless.

"My time has come, Edward. I meet my end on my own terms." Her jaw was set, and her black eyes burned deeply. What could I say? I could never argue with Alice.

I helped her stand, and with one last look on her face, I ran out onto the moors and away from the approaching fire. My mind yelled at me to stop, to return to Alice and fight for her, but her mind was made up. She would listen to no further reasoning from me and her thought only willed me to run faster.

As I ran across the moors, refusing to turn my eyes back, I heard Alice's voice singing above the sound of the falling rain and crackling wood.

She was singing Bella's lullaby.


	7. The Silent Pipes

I ran for most of the night. I ran through the rain and the mire until I saw the Aillte an Mhothair. When I reached the edge of the cliffs, the edge of my rope, I stopped.

I hadn't a clue what to do now.

I slumped to the ground as the weight of the last few hours began to overwhelm me. For the past few decades, my life had seemed so eternally finite. I ate, I slept, I went about the duties that Aro assigned me. For one hundred years, my life had simply continued. But with one quick swipe, Alice had changed that. I felt a longing now to seek out my…family. If only to see what had become of them. If only to find out what happened when I left.

My mind's eye saw red. I wanted to find the mysterious man who always stood beside Alice. I wanted him to hurt for her, grieve for her, just as I was mourning right now. I wanted him to pay for the pain she felt. I was angry at him for her, even if I didn't know the reason why.

I had absolutely no idea where to start.

I knew they wouldn't be in Forks. Too soon. People, the tribe especially, might still remember us. When we left Forks, they had all headed to Dartmouth. But they would have moved on from there by now. Alaska was always a possibility, but only for a short time. No one could tolerate those three for long. Knowing Carlisle, they would have returned to Europe. He has spoken of it, even in those early days. He missed the civility, I suppose. But even with Europe, the choices spread out almost endlessly. France, Scotland, Norway. Even Russia stood as a possibility. All of the remote and dreary landscapes we had discussed flash through my mind. But I couldn't check them all at once. I rub my temple and sighed with pure mental exhaustion.

Even though Europe seemed like the choice Carlisle would make, New Mexico was locked in the forefront of my mind. It wasn't Carlisle who had mentioned it. During our endless hours of free time, one of the others had found that New Mexico was one of the most uninhabited areas of the States, despite the long hours of sunlight. I don't know why, but I needed to go there. I was searching for answers, and those answers were back in the States.

"Dia is Muire duit, lobe. Ey ye be oot on te'eights o' suche soft ol' nigh? 'Avn' ye a cailín o' e'mistress?"

I tried to control the start I felt, having let a human walk so close without sparking my attention. She stood facing me, with the moonshadows falling on her hair. She was every bit an Irish maiden, her accent hanging thick around her dark auburn hair. Her coy smile and her thoughts told me what my body already knew: she had her mind set on me tonight.

I must have seemed a sight sitting there, but the moonlight softened the darkness under my eyes. I didn't say a word as she slid across the grass toward me, her hand reaching out for my face until she brushed my cheek with her fingertips. She didn't shy away from my coldness, otherworldness. She was intoxicated by the sight of me, I could tell. She leaned forward to place a kiss on my cheek, hair falling around her face and mine. I caught her scent in the wind.

Freesia.

It was subtle, just the slightest whiff, but it was enough to pull my mind away from the vision of beauty before me. All at once, I wanted to rip her throat from her neck.

All at once, I didn't want to be a monster any longer.

"Síoraí," I growled under my breath. She pulled her face away, her lust-filled eyes suddenly swimming with suspicion.

"Tá mé ag cáineadh. The damned have no loyalty, and they let no one go free." My words were soft, but the tone screamed the danger of this moment. She pulled away slowly, backing toward the path behind her. To her misfortune, she stepped down on a large stone. With a clumsiness I remembered from my dreams, she fell backwards, her auburn hair flowing in the wind and waving her scent toward my open mouth. I couldn't help myself.

I pounced atop her before she fully hit the ground. The devil within me growled and hissed with pleasure. I lay there above her, seconds from draining her blood, when I saw a different face before my eyes.

Alice had come back to haunt me, and the disappointment in her eyes tore through my bloodrage.

I caught hold of the monster within me. As I loosened my grasp on the young cailín, I hissed only one word.

"Run."

She wasted no time scrambling up from the grass and taking to heel down the path. I watched her run, imagining it to be my sweet Bella, knowing that it never would be. I could not let my Bella leave to run through the fields. I could never beg my Bella for the forgiveness I so desired. I could never love her in the only way that she deserved or demanded.

I knew immediately that I had to leave the area. It would be only a matter of time before she found enough men to form a rabble, and they would seek me out to burn me then. But for a moment, I remained on my hands and knees, face to the ground. Sobs racked my body, but I could cry no tears. Here I was, a terror among the gods, and I could not feed on a young girl. I could only think of Bella. My conscious ate at me like a nightmare.

Alice was right.

I had to find my family.

I needed to patch my soul together again.

I had to go to New Mexico.


	8. North of Heaven

Where the rain don't fall  
And the grass don't grow  
The older part of New Mexico…

Harding County, New Mexico.

The most desolate and isolated place in the universe.

While I didn't venture out during the day, it probably wouldn't have matter if I stood outside at high noon. There wasn't a soul for miles who could see me. A vampire could hide in plain sight here, and many did. The climate shift had made matters worse for the humans, pushing temperatures well over 150 degrees on a good day. That heat had driven everyone from this forsaken country decades earlier, and only a very few natives refused to give up their stake in the land. Most had long since abandoned New Mexico to the desert, choosing to live in the large, more modern cities to the north. After all, who in their right mind would ever choose to live in a sandbowl with no way to cool air and very little water? Humans had always been creatures of comfort, and New Mexico offered no comfort. No one but a vampire would find the scorching temperatures habitable.

Even in the early days of settlement, people had shied away from New Mexico. The miles of heated sand caused most humans to hallucinate, and the isolation of a desert town only compounded the tendency to exaggerate. Perhaps that was why the vampires of the South had always been so violent. They were swept away with the prolific stories of the natives, none of which could possibly be true. The entire country lived in a continuous state of fiction, with each ghost and demon more horrifying than the last.

But then, maybe their stories were all true.

Even though I didn't sweat, I couldn't help but wipe my brow as I stood in the shadow of the pueblo. The structure had long since been abandoned by the natives, but it served as an excellent hiding place for me during this expedition. I didn't venture outside during the day, not because I feared detection by the natives, but because I feared dealing with the vampires. A nomad vampire ran a high risk of death in this place, and the southern vampires had grown use to their freedom. They killed as they desired.

Searching the desert took longer than one would expect. Especially when the desert was larger than first imagined. Even though I knew that the desert grew each year, with more and more heated sand overtaking the lush green of the plains, it took seeing the vastness of the desert to truly understand the massive change. I should have brought another member of the guard, someone to help me search, except that then, I would need to explain myself to Aro. I knew he would disapprove of my current actions. He feared that I would one day leave him and go back to my maker, Carlisle. But I could never return to Carlisle. I was sure I could not live through the shame of having failed again. Carlisle was so pure, so firm in his belief of protecting human life. Myself? I believed only in protecting my soul.

When Bella had died, I abandoned all hope. God had left me, and my soul was no longer worth protecting. I threw myself into the bloody lifestyle of the Voltori, and with each body I drained, I felt my appearance mimic the darkness I felt within. I was damned.

I turned on my heel and headed back inside to consult my map. Today was the last day I could afford to remain in this place. I had found some stray wildlife to feed on for the past few days, but the lack of human life in the desert meant that I lacked a food source as well. One could only live on jackrabbits for a short time.

I sneered at myself as I heard Carlisle's voice in my head. There are other ways to survive... His view on eating jackrabbits was easy to guess. Anything over his beloved humans.

After ten minutes of memorizing the map lines, I felt a presence. Another vampire was close. I glance out the window in front of me, apprehensive about meeting another nomad this far from any civilized town. On the edge of my vision, hazy with the rising heat, I saw two vampires running. I focused, but I still felt only one. A frown creased my forehead as I weighed out my options, but it didn't matter. No sooner had I decided to let them pass than they turned toward the pueblo.

Shit.

Quickly, I decided to walk out into the sun as they approached. Perhaps the element of surprise would work in my favor. Who would expect to find another vampire this far into the wilderness, with the closest source of food hundreds of miles north?

I walked to the middle of the courtyard, the sun's light reflecting off the sand at my feet. Even though they were still quite a distance off, I felt the two hesitate. They continued toward me but at a slower pace. I could barely make out their figures, one male and one female. She fell in step behind the male as they approached, hiding herself in his shadow. He would protect her with his life. I could tell.

When they were still a few hundred feet off, they stopped. I could feel the worry building in his mind, but hers was still blank. Perhaps because she was so dependent on her male protector? I shook away the questions as I focused on the gentlemanly male.

He dressed well for a nomad, with kept blonde hair and blood-red eyes. He had obviously been in enough contact with the humans to pick up their style of dress and to feed on them. I abhorred the modern dress, but he wore the fitting pants and billowing sleeves well. Despite his dress, he looked…familiar, but I couldn't place the memory he was associated with. Like he was part of a dream from which I woke up too soon. We nodded at each other, apprehensive and tense. Neither of us breathed a word. I felt the questions running through his mind as well, as if he knew me. Then, she moved to stand by his side.

Bella.

Only the Bella in my mind had chocolate eyes and a blush to her skin. Her heart beat rapidly and blood still coursed through her veins. This Bella was feral, wild, with a beauty beyond all explanation. Her brown and red hair spilled down her back in curls, set off by the black lace that framed her neck. The style of clothing was wrong. Too modern, too hip, not the jeans and shirt I saw in my mind. Yet she was still my Bella, I was certain.

The vicious lady standing by that man's side was my Bella.

She was a demon, sent from hell to torment me. My Bella, the true Bella, was dead.

Undead

"Edward." The gentleman said my name with a full Southern American drawl. Something about his tone told me that he sensed the feelings at war within me. From his thoughts, I picked out that he had the ability to control emotions…could he sense them as well? My eyes darkened as they met his full-on, daring him to make the first move. I stalked around him without ever taking an eye from him. I didn't trust him. He made me nervous.

Besides, he had that devil woman next to him.

Still, I turned my eyes toward her softly, hardly believing that it could be true. Her eyes had fallen shut as she tossed her hair back. The sun threw rays off her skin, thousands of diamond rays that would blind the naked human eye.

Yet, it must be true. No one's mind had ever been silent to me, save hers, and I had before me a person with nary a thought in her mind. It must be Bella.

Just then, her eyes snapped open. They pierced through me, causing me to reel back in shock and pain. The hatred that boiled in her red eyes rivaled the burn of venom in my veins. As her face began to register recognition, her anger slapped against me, causing me to hiss involuntarily as I closed my eyes. The violence of her emotions was overwhelming, and I couldn't hold her gaze any longer.

The gentleman smiled. "Ah, Edward. I see you remember Bella…Mrs. Bella Whitlock."

His memories began to assault me as he unleashed the last hundred years upon me. I saw myself kneeling in the meadow, cradling Bella in my arms. I saw myself running, leaving her, as the smell of her blood overwhelmed this man. I saw Alice, sweet pixie Alice, trying to hold this man back. "Jasper…"

Jasper. His name. The controller of emotions. The one I couldn't remember.

It all came back to me in a rush.

He was the reason I had left Bella the first time. He had fed on animals for the shortest period of time, always preferring the taste of human blood to that of deer. He was the newest member of our coven. He had attacked her during a party, her party, and I realized then the danger that our existence posed for her. I left her to keep her safe from the monster I saw in Jasper. The monster I saw in myself.

The monster that she had become.

Jasper was the reason I left.

Now, Jasper was the reason she had been turned.

This was the piece that Alice had locked out of her mind, yet Jasper saw it fresh and clear. I had run, but Jasper…he had stayed. As she lay on the ground, the scent of her fresh blood had overwhelmed him. Alice couldn't contain him as he rushed toward the body on the ground and brought her into his arms. Alice couldn't stop him as his teeth sunk deep into her neck. But she did pull him away before he drained her body of its blood. By then, the venom had already started its work.

Jasper assaulted me with these early memories, while Bella's angry red eyes pierced through my soul. The agony of his thoughts and her gaze drove me to my knees. Finally, I could take it no longer. I did just as I had a hundred years earlier.

I ran.


End file.
